Photo: F4 UAE
Martinius Stenshorne has lost his Formula Regional Middle East victory in race three at Yas Marina Circuit, as well as the points lead, to a penalty.
The R-ace GP driver had earned the win with a pass on PHM Racing’s Taylor Barnard at turn 13, but he had come off the track and onto the kerbs with all four wheels exiting turn 12 and he had to rejoin the asphalt to make the next corner.
He squeezed past Barnard as he did so, and a few laps later the move was put under investigation. Following that, Stenshorne set fastest lap after fastest lap to build a gap, but it was not enough to overcome the five-second penalty he was handed post-race and so Barnard inherited victory by 0.86 seconds.
Stenshorne goes from being 10 points ahead of Barnard at the top of the championship standings to now being six behind him (in part due to another driver’s penalty), with his team-mate Tuukka Taponen a further 10 behind in third place.
R-ace has also been given a suspended €1,000 fine for sending Zachary David on track with #77 on his nose rather than #20 in practice earlier in the weekend.
There were several other post-race penalties handed out in Abu Dhabi for FRME and the Formula 4 United Arab Emirates support races.
Sainteloc Racing’s Theophile Nael dropped from eighth to 10th in the FRME race two results after getting a five-second penalty for causing a collision that led to MP Motorsport’s Valerio Rinicella spinning, and that meant Barnard and Rinicella’s team-mate Bruno del Pino scored extra points.
Nikhil Bohra, another MP driver who finished outside of the points, got a five-second penalty for gaining an advantage by exceeding track limits.
In race three, R-ace GP’s Jesse Carrasquedo committed the same offence and got the same penalty, but was already outside of the points too, while MP’s retiree Emmo Fittipaldi got disqualified from the race results for a technical infringement.
In F4 UAE, PHM’s Nikita Bedrin picked up a 10s penalty that is suspended until the end of the season due to having his front wing in front of race leader Jack Beeton’s rear tyre during a safety car restart in race two. Prema’s Doriane Pin got a 10s penalty in that race for causing a collision with Rashid Al Dhaheri, and it dropped her from 12th to 20th in the final results.
Mumbai Falcons’ Alex Powell received a smaller but more costly penalty in race three, as the five seconds added to his race time for causing a collision with Bedrin at turn 12 meant he was classified 14th rather than sixth. The loss of points drops him from seventh to ninth in the standings.